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nogods
Joined: 03 Jul 2004
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 Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 6:57 pm Post subject: |
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| CatholicConvert wrote: | | Mr_C wrote: |
To answer your question, I don't think we're thinking of the same ethical problem here. I'm saying basically this:
(a) The embryo inside a pregnant American woman will most likely become a person unless aborted.
(b) It is wrong to kill people.
(c) Therefore, it is generally unethical for a pregnant American woman to have an abortion.
The opinion that the embryo is not yet a person is irrelevant. |
Well said.
I'm being picky, but I would modify a) as follows:
"A viable embryo inside a pregnant WILL become a person unless aborted." (I'm excluding pathological biological incidents like stillbirth and spontaneous abortions here.)
Also, remove "generally" and "American" from c). |
So what, potential as little value, while only a potential - it is only fulfilled potential that has value.
A bag of flour and some yeast, as the potential to be a loaf of bread, but that would not give me the right to misleading sell it to someone as a loaf of bread.
An acorn has the potential to become an oak tree, however, an acorn is not an oak tree. I could not flog an acorn to a timber yard as oak, can you imagine the responce one would get if one tried,
An embryo as the potential to become a person, however - that does not make the embryo a person. Imagine a hospital saying to a woman who spontaneously aborted, here take your potential 'child' home with you.
As I said, potential has little, if no value, it is only fulfilled potential that has value.
nogods
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nogods
Joined: 03 Jul 2004
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Location: Vienna, Austria
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| Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 7:04 pm Post subject: |
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| Mr_C wrote: | | Moloth wrote: | | Mr_C wrote: | | Perhaps the point is whether or not this mass of tissue was GOING to become a human, unless intervened upon. And the ethical consequences of intervening. |
Every sperm is sacred....  |
Missing the point 
Not every sperm is GOING to become human unless intervened upon. |
The sin of Odanism, in early and medevil theology was belived to be the spilling of one's seed. of not allowing a potential conception to take place, as would have happened if the sperm had been ejaculated inside a woman's womb. God killed Onan for this sin.
"8 And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife, and perform the duty of a husband's brother unto her, and raise up seed to thy brother.
9 And Onan knew that the seed would not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest he should give seed to his brother.
10 And the thing which he did was evil in the sight of Jehovah: and he slew him also."
Catholic theology, has not changed very much, which is why it opposes all contraception and masturbation as mortal (Not venial) sins.
nogods
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Uncertainty
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Joined: 23 Oct 2005
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| Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 7:13 pm Post subject: |
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| Now that I think about that story it's kind of weird. Doesn't that mean he still had sex with his brothers wife, he just didn't think he should have a kid with her? O_o |
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nogods
Joined: 03 Jul 2004
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| Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 7:13 pm Post subject: |
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| CET wrote: | | Moloth wrote: | | Perhaps, ethics has to do with suffering. |
Then drugging a person and then killing them is OK, because they're not suffering. |
What about the will to survive!
Is it harmful to that beings well-being to interfere with it's will to survive? What about the freedom of the being drugged - would they consent?
Harm is surely about more then physical pain?
nogods
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nogods
Joined: 03 Jul 2004
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| Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 7:17 pm Post subject: |
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| Mr_C wrote: |
[Because once a person is conceived, they will soon be a human being. At no point before conception can you claim that, statistically speaking. |
Once a person is perceived? so a sperm and an egg, a zygote is a person?
Where did this property of 'person' come from, if it magically appeared at the moment of conception? Was half of it in the sperm and half in the egg? Was it external to both the sperm and the egg, and magically got added by God when he inplanted the 'soul'?
Personhood is not conceived it develops overtime.
Oak trees do not grow in Acorns.
nogods
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nogods
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| Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Uncertainty wrote: | | Now that I think about that story it's kind of weird. Doesn't that mean he still had sex with his brothers wife, he just didn't think he should have a kid with her? O_o |
Yes, it meant he withdrew before ejaculation, and spilt his seed on the ground. Now this is no gurantee that conception will not happen, but it makes it far less likely.
It is a popular form of 'contraception' in Catholic coutries, I am told
nogods
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Sal1981
Do you hear me now?
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| Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 8:40 pm Post subject: |
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| nogods wrote: | | CatholicConvert wrote: | | Mr_C wrote: |
To answer your question, I don't think we're thinking of the same ethical problem here. I'm saying basically this:
(a) The embryo inside a pregnant American woman will most likely become a person unless aborted.
(b) It is wrong to kill people.
(c) Therefore, it is generally unethical for a pregnant American woman to have an abortion.
The opinion that the embryo is not yet a person is irrelevant. |
Well said.
I'm being picky, but I would modify a) as follows:
"A viable embryo inside a pregnant WILL become a person unless aborted." (I'm excluding pathological biological incidents like stillbirth and spontaneous abortions here.)
Also, remove "generally" and "American" from c). |
So what, potential as little value, while only a potential - it is only fulfilled potential that has value.
A bag of flour and some yeast, as the potential to be a loaf of bread, but that would not give me the right to misleading sell it to someone as a loaf of bread.
An acorn has the potential to become an oak tree, however, an acorn is not an oak tree. I could not flog an acorn to a timber yard as oak, can you imagine the responce one would get if one tried,
An embryo as the potential to become a person, however - that does not make the embryo a person. Imagine a hospital saying to a woman who spontaneously aborted, here take your potential 'child' home with you.
As I said, potential has little, if no value, it is only fulfilled potential that has value.
nogods |
"potential" is nothing more than a play on "what if", it's just the same.
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Eyedunno
The Great JuJu at the Bottom of the Sea
Joined: 13 Aug 2005
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 3:20 am Post subject: |
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| CET wrote: | | Eyedunno wrote: | | Heck, I feel like taking this a bit farther. My hair follicles have the same DNA I do. So my hair follicles are people? You, on the other hand, have different DNA from mine (just like a chimp does!). So you're not a person, right? |
Strawman. Again, when did I say that DNA is a person? When did I say that any single body part is a person? When you stop misrepresenting my argument and then we can have a rational exchange. |
Oh, I got that. But hair follicle != DNA. It does have DNA, however:
| CET wrote: | | A fetus has exactly the same DNA that it will have after it's born. |
With a few more technological advances, we will be able to turn any living human cell into the equivalent of a zygote, which will, under the right circumstances, develop into an embryo. Thus plucking a hair is, in a very real sense, killing potential persons. Whether to say that a zygote (or that hair follicle) is a person is the issue here, and to me it seems utterly bizarre to call them people, though they are human in some sense (the DNA thing actually being relevant here). CatholicConvert doesn't seem to understand the distinction (though it seems strange to me, as he/she is using the same language we are, and I doubt he/she ever points to a baby saying "look at that person over there" or refers to a pregnant woman as two people).
As for the baby thing, I don't think the line blurs for newborns at all - they're still not persons. When you get to talking about a two-year old, then you're getting really blurry. I think birth is a good point to draw the line in most cases though, if only for political expediency, since the actual process of birth is generally measured in hours, and the distinction between born and unborn is obvious in most cases (so the domain of legal debate would only enter the actual period of childbirth).
| Mr_C wrote: | (a) The embryo inside a pregnant American woman will most likely become a person unless aborted.
(b) It is wrong to kill people.
(c) Therefore, it is generally unethical for a pregnant American woman to have an abortion.
The opinion that the embryo is not yet a person is irrelevant. |
 Why not? It would seem to me to be very relevant. If it's wrong to kill people, an embryo is not yet a person, and you kill an embryo, then you're not killing a person and therefore not necessarily doing something wrong. It's the distinction between killing a person and preventing a person from coming to be in the first place.
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Terrordar
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Location: Canada.... .... .... .... eh?
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 4:38 am Post subject: |
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Pro-Choice.
In point of fact, I have a story, its a game of numbers my friends. Abortion should be legal, though I honestly agree on limitations of said practice.
An abortion happened in my family, and as a result, I was born.
My older "brother" if you will, would have most likely been born with multiple ailments, his father cheated on my mother, and my mother was sick at the time. Financially incapable, ill, and with a child with a high likelyhood of deformation, my mother decidingly aborted the fetus. But also pointed out the father and financial sitation, were themain drivers behind said decision.
Now then, let's get to the main points.
It is a lump of flesh, its human, yes, but its not a person, and potential doesn't mean anything until it comes to fruition.
Now, say my older brother was born. Immediately, my mom, who is a left-wing individual who believes in not having children one can't support, if she hadn't just tossed the child into adoption, would still be single and divorced.
My "Brother", even if he had been fortunate enough to live without deformation, would also probably prevent my mother, from meeting my father. Thus, her other two children, myself and my sister, would not be born. Even if she had met my father. Financial situations, once again, would have limited them. They barely had me even due to money.
So at most, someone in the proxy place of my sister would have been born, as my mother had her tubes tied right after me.
That basically means, in all likelyhood, I would have never been born, but by the numbers, there are in all probability, more people here today, because my older brother was destroyed shortly after he was conceived.
Interesting how that works, isn't it?
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Eyedunno
The Great JuJu at the Bottom of the Sea
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 6:57 am Post subject: |
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| Terrordar wrote: | That basically means, in all likelyhood, I would have never been born, but by the numbers, there are in all probability, more people here today, because my older brother was destroyed shortly after he was conceived.
Interesting how that works, isn't it? |
Yeah. I was raised Catholic, and still feel strong (cultural, not dogmatic!) ties to the church, as I've said in here before. But when I was 11 or 12, our youth group was shown this video about this kid with Down's Syndrome or some other form of mild mental retardation, and he saves another kid from an oncoming car, then goes up to his attic, finds his mom's diary, reads it, and discovers his mom had an abortion. He then vanishes, time slips backward, and the kid gets hit by the car.
However, the video left out the guy who assassinated Hitler in 1935, but whose pappy got distracted by a woodpecker outside and ejaculated four seconds later than he otherwise would have, thus producing some other kid instead. How is abortion an act of human will in defiance of God's plans, while delayed ejaculation is not (note that I deliberately leave out coitus interruptus, as it's iffy whether even that's technically allowed in Catholicism)? |
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CET
The Spiritual Atheist
Joined: 02 Apr 2003
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 12:18 pm Post subject: |
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| Eyedunno wrote: | | Heck, I feel like taking this a bit farther. My hair follicles have the same DNA I do. So my hair follicles are people? You, on the other hand, have different DNA from mine (just like a chimp does!). So you're not a person, right? |
| CET wrote: | | Strawman. Again, when did I say that DNA is a person? When did I say that any single body part is a person? When you stop misrepresenting my argument and then we can have a rational exchange. |
| Eyedunno wrote: | Oh, I got that. But hair follicle != DNA. It does have DNA, however:
| CET wrote: | | A fetus has exactly the same DNA that it will have after it's born. |
With a few more technological advances, we will be able to turn any living human cell into the equivalent of a zygote, which will, under the right circumstances, develop into an embryo. Thus plucking a hair is, in a very real sense, killing potential persons. |
A single hair will NEVER grow into a human, but a zygote ALWAYS will.
| Eyedunno wrote: | | Whether to say that a zygote (or that hair follicle) is a person is the issue here, and to me it seems utterly bizarre to call them people, though they are human in some sense (the DNA thing actually being relevant here). |
A zygote is a person at the initial stage of growth and development, which will continue until it dies.
| Eyedunno wrote: | As for the baby thing, I don't think the line blurs for newborns at all - they're still not persons.
When you get to talking about a two-year old, then you're getting really blurry. |
Then it's OK to kill babies? 
| Eyedunno wrote: | | I think birth is a good point to draw the line in most cases though, if only for political expediency, since the actual process of birth is generally measured in hours, and the distinction between born and unborn is obvious in most cases (so the domain of legal debate would only enter the actual period of childbirth). |
BC is the BOMB! Use it early, use it often.
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"Much of the suffering in the world comes from the delusion that we are separate from one another." - Gautama Buddha
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CET
The Spiritual Atheist
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 12:25 pm Post subject: |
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| Terrordar wrote: | Pro-Choice.
In point of fact, I have a story, its a game of numbers my friends. Abortion should be legal, though I honestly agree on limitations of said practice. |
Agreed
| Terrordar wrote: | An abortion happened in my family, and as a result, I was born.
My older "brother" if you will, would have most likely been born with multiple ailments, his father cheated on my mother, and my mother was sick at the time. Financially incapable, ill, and with a child with a high likelyhood of deformation, my mother decidingly aborted the fetus. But also pointed out the father and financial sitation, were themain drivers behind said decision. |
Appropriate. My ex-wife and I decided she should get an abortion when we found out that she was carrying a baby with no brain. She miscarried before we could go through with it, but everyone would have been worse off if she were to carry to term. We talked about when an abortion would be appropriate and inappropriate. We decided that any major defects would be grounds for abortion. Having a child with ailments that will torment his and our existence doesn't seem like a good idea to go through with.
| Terrordar wrote: | Now then, let's get to the main points.
It is a lump of flesh, its human, yes, but its not a person, and potential doesn't mean anything until it comes to fruition. |
When does a person come into "fruition"? It's alive, eating, excreting, growing and developing as a zygote, just as it is as an old man.
| Terrordar wrote: | Now, say my older brother was born. Immediately, my mom, who is a left-wing individual who believes in not having children one can't support, if she hadn't just tossed the child into adoption, would still be single and divorced.
My "Brother", even if he had been fortunate enough to live without deformation, would also probably prevent my mother, from meeting my father. Thus, her other two children, myself and my sister, would not be born. Even if she had met my father. Financial situations, once again, would have limited them. They barely had me even due to money.
So at most, someone in the proxy place of my sister would have been born, as my mother had her tubes tied right after me.
That basically means, in all likelyhood, I would have never been born, but by the numbers, there are in all probability, more people here today, because my older brother was destroyed shortly after he was conceived.
Interesting how that works, isn't it? |
You're arguing potentials as though they're reality, they're not. If you go there, then you can't abort any child because "that child might be the next Mozart". It's a spurious argument.
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CET
The Spiritual Atheist
"Much of the suffering in the world comes from the delusion that we are separate from one another." - Gautama Buddha
"Those who dance are considered insane by those who can't hear the music." - George Carlin |
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Terrordar
Forum Plebian
Joined: 16 Dec 2006
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Location: Canada.... .... .... .... eh?
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 12:36 pm Post subject: |
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Bah! I'll argue potentials all I want, but, I'll make one better on top of it too.
I hope she had aborted Motzart, just to deny humanity a little more, and create just a speck more hate in the world! 
What do you expect from me? I've got a Daemon as my Avatar... a DAEMON!
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Eyedunno
The Great JuJu at the Bottom of the Sea
Joined: 13 Aug 2005
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Location: Cin City, OH!
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 1:05 pm Post subject: |
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| CET wrote: | | A single hair will NEVER grow into a human, but a zygote ALWAYS will. |
Bullshit. Just that when a zygote dies, we call it "not getting pregnant," same as with other very early stages of pregnancy. As for the hair, well, it wouldn't get there without the right kind of laboratory work and a donor womb (or perhaps an artificial womb of some sort), but my point is that the potential is still there.
| CET wrote: | | Eyedunno wrote: | As for the baby thing, I don't think the line blurs for newborns at all - they're still not persons.
When you get to talking about a two-year old, then you're getting really blurry. |
Then it's OK to kill babies? |
You obviously read the next part, and still asked this? Anyway, a newborn cannot plan for the future, and almost certainly has no meaningful concept of minds outside its own, so "person" wouldn't seem to apply. But Peter Singer nails this one better than I can (though for the record, I still think Animal Rights is almost always a crazy idea ), and he's gotten a lot of flak over it from right-wingers:
http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/faq.html
| Quote: | Q. You have been quoted as saying: "Killing a defective infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Sometimes it is not wrong at all." Is that quote accurate?
A. It is accurate, but can be misleading if read without an understanding of what I mean by the term “person” (which is discussed in Practical Ethics, from which that quotation is taken). I use the term "person" to refer to a being who is capable of anticipating the future, of having wants and desires for the future. As I have said in answer to the previous question, I think that it is generally a greater wrong to kill such a being than it is to kill a being that has no sense of existing over time. Newborn human babies have no sense of their own existence over time. So killing a newborn baby is never equivalent to killing a person, that is, a being who wants to go on living. That doesn’t mean that it is not almost always a terrible thing to do. It is, but that is because most infants are loved and cherished by their parents, and to kill an infant is usually to do a great wrong to its parents.
Sometimes, perhaps because the baby has a serious disability, parents think it better that their newborn infant should die. Many doctors will accept their wishes, to the extent of not giving the baby life-supporting medical treatment. That will often ensure that the baby dies. My view is different from this, only to the extent that if a decision is taken, by the parents and doctors, that it is better that a baby should die, I believe it should be possible to carry out that decision, not only by withholding or withdrawing life-support – which can lead to the baby dying slowly from dehydration or from an infection - but also by taking active steps to end the baby’s life swiftly and humanely. |
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Eyedunno
The Great JuJu at the Bottom of the Sea
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Location: Cin City, OH!
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| Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 1:21 pm Post subject: |
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Oh, and sorry to hear about the miscarriage. It seems like both of you handled it well though, with concern for quality of life of the baby placed above your own desire for children.
I still don't care for the "eating, excreting, growing and developing" stuff. Mildew also does all of those things, and I assume you still clean your shower. I don't see how having human DNA changes anything. DNA, no matter how complex it is, doesn't think, plan, or contribute to society. It takes a developed brain and a certain period of maturation to do those things.
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